'True,' said the host, 'and I will help with all my strength. The consul would not help at all. He would but frighten the police, with the result that they would torture—perhaps hang—a man or two, but not the man who stole your belt of money. Our police, when not alarmed, are clever. Go to them and give a little money. They will find the thief.'
'I go this minute,' said Rashîd.
I bade him wait. Knowing his way of magnifying me and my possessions, I thought it better to be present at the interview, lest he should frighten the police no less than would the intervention of a consul.
We went together through the shady markets, crossing here and there an open space of blinding sunlight, asking our way at intervals, until at last we entered a large whitewashed room where soldiers loitered and a frock-coated, be-fezzed official sat writing at a desk. This personage was very sympathetic.
'Twelve pounds!' he cried. 'It is a serious sum. The first thing to be done is to survey the scene of crime. Wait, I will send with you a knowing man.'
He called one of the soldiers, who stepped forward and saluted, and gave him charge of the affair.
'You can place confidence in him. He knows his business,' he assured me, bowing with extreme politeness, as we took our leave.
With the soldier who had been assigned to us we sauntered back to the hotel. The man abounded in compassion for me. He said it was the worst case he had ever heard of—to rob a man so manifestly good and amiable of so great a sum. Alas! the badness of some people. It put out the sun!
At the hotel he spent a long while in my room, searching, as he said, for 'traces.' Rashîd, the host and all his family, and nearly all the servants, thronged the doorway. After looking into every drawer, and crawling underneath the bed, which he unmade completely, he spent some minutes in debating whether the thief had entered by the window or the door. Having at last decided for the door, he turned to me and asked if there was anybody I suspected. When I answered 'no,' I saw him throw a side-glance at Rashîd, as if he thought him fortunate in having so obtuse a master. As he was departing, Rashîd, at my command, gave him a silver coin, for which he kissed my hand and, having done so, said:
'I know a clever man, none like him for such business. I will send him to your presence in an hour.'